For some reason, I noticed that I always seemed to have a lack of Plus/Same opportunities in-game while the AI always seems to have a plethora of opportunities in every game.

I decided to try and "trick" the AI into allowing me an easy Same combo. I left myself open in one square, trying to goad the AI into attacking my weak sides from there. It could've flipped at least one of my cards that way, and then I could've Same'd off of the card it would've played.

It didn't take the bait. Instead of taking my cards, as I've known the ever-aggressive AI to do, it instead played defensively and put its card somewhere completely out of the way where I couldn't Same or Plus against it.

Whenever I open myself up to try and goad the AI to attack from a certain angle to stall so I can Same or Plus, it -always- stuffs a card in the space I'd need to Same or Plus from instead. It seems to actively avoid playing any combinations that I can Same or Plus from. The only way I can Same or Plus the AI is if I set up a morton's fork with my own cards, which is absurdly hard to do.

The AI is brilliant and it's kind of infuriating. There's gotta be some way to beat this thing in a Same/Plus game. Help? I'm still at Lv 1 cards...

I may or may not have found such an honorless way of winning... Playing without Plus or Same makes a huge difference. And Geezard plus Cockatrice is an absurdly powerful opener against the AI and untrained players at level 1.

The strategy doesn't work every time--I draw about as often as I win, but in the past seven or eight times playing I've only actually lost once.

Now if only I could do the same thing with Same/Plus. ._. At least I have an AI grinding strategy I guess.

You open: Snow lion in bottom middle spot- After AI takes your Snow lion, take it back with Hexadragon- After this a couple of different things could happen, but usually attacking is the best way to go

* Win rate: about 60% (2 scenarios where you have a 100% draw, 2 scenarios where you'll have to make a lucky 50% guess, and 4 scenarios where you have a 100% win)

AI opening 1: Wendigo in bottom right corner- Take AI's Wendigo with Bomb- After AI takes your Bomb, take it back with Snow lion- After this, the hand plays itself

* Win rate: 100%

AI opening 2: Blitz/Turtapod in top right corner- Take AI's Blitz/Turtapod with Snow lion- AI will place a card below Snow lion: take that AI card with Bomb- After this, the hand plays itself

* Win rate: 100%

AI opening 3: Bomb in top left corner- Take AI's Bomb with Snow lion- AI can react in two different ways: 1. AI places a card right of Snow lion: react by playing your Bomb next to the Bomb you took (so no attacking) 2. AI places a card below Snow lion: take that AI card with Turtapod- After this the hand plays itself

* Win rate: 100%

AI opening 4: Blitz in bottom right corner- Take AI's Blitz with Snow lion- AI will place a card left of Snow lion: take that AI card with Wendigo (from bottom)- After this, the hand will play itself

* Win rate: about 80% (about 1 in 5 times AI has a Blue dragon which spoils the party)

wellp here's my opinion on how to win vs the AI with same - plus rules, although i think it is easier to use combo in this situation

making two plus/same possibilities is a good strategy against AI 'cuz he mostly closes one of them on his next move

the outcome usually looks like this

of course it is always better to make the 2 plus/same possibility with a single card so that you have your other cards free for playing (more of an advice for playing vs players than AI, since it doesnt make much of a difference when AI usually closes 1 of 2 possible plus/same options)

using same/plus this way works just fine even without the *combo* rule, although its not as effective

also it is usually better to use *same* than *plus* when playing with combo/combo+, bcuz opponent cant turn the card that used *same* by using *combo* on the cards that were turned ... if you understand what im saying lol

Open up with Geezard in the Right space. It's open on both 1s.The AI will always attack and flip Geezard from either above or below (there's no card that can flip it from its 5 side at level 1).Then I play Cockatrice in the space above or below Geezard that wasn't taken. Since Cockatrice has 2 Up and Down, and 6 on its left, it can flip Geezard from either position and then be unflippable from the left. So you have two guaranteed cards on the table.

From there, just play super-aggressively with your remaining three cards. Since they're all weak on two sides, you can leave them each completely open; the AI will try to take the card, and then you can take it from the side that wasn't attacked, effectively boxing the card in. Alternately, you can play defensively and box yourself in using the high values of each card for defense.

Also @ Pokemon Master, Aaaaah @_@ See, I'm trying to figure out what cards are able to combo and which aren't. I actually started a (rather lazily done) PowerPoint project to try and figure out which cards can Same or Plus with which so that I can use the rule to its maximum efficiency. It's not really going too well though... there's just so many combinations, aaaagh.

My lazy farm method when completing the deck was to grab 1xLv8 4xLv1. The AI will use his strongest card as an opener, or to take over your first card played (not 100% chance if he has Mog or Chicobo). Then he'll be left with only the weak Lv1s and that's easy pickings when you play your own GF card at the end. Lots of wins, guaranteed draws and a LOT of effort to lose.

Tiayviel wrote:My lazy farm method when completing the deck was to grab 1xLv8 4xLv1. The AI will use his strongest card as an opener, or to take over your first card played (not 100% chance if he has Mog or Chicobo). Then he'll be left with only the weak Lv1s and that's easy pickings when you play your own GF card at the end. Lots of wins, guaranteed draws and a LOT of effort to lose.

I'm guessing Lv9 would work just as well, I just went the FFVIII route and got Ifrit because it was the first obtainable GF card in that game (Mog doesn't really count) and stuck with it. Just pick a card that has the most 6 left/top/bottom and/or more than 6 on the right (to take over Cocka).